Risk Rewarded Blog

Stocks initially plunged in trading Tuesday as a meeting of Eurogroup finance ministers broke up with no new deal for Greece, taking the S&P 500 down below its 200-day moving average for the first time since October.That threatened a level of support that has held stocks aloft, save last year's Ebola-driven scare, since late 2012. No wonder President...

For many, understanding the way markets work is daunting. They like to tell us we should just leave all of that stuff to the slide rule crowd and be done with it. But “it” isn’t really all that hard to understand, in fact, it’s pretty easy.Rallies happen when buyers get aggressive and demand stock from holders. The holders are like, "Hey, I've...

Coming out of the lows of sentiment like we saw last week, technical analysts always like to look for evidence of price action known as a "buying thrust." These are almost mythical advances out of a bottom that appear out of nowhere, and most people are hugely skeptical about.Because almost everyone has recently been so negative on the market when these...

Despite all the unwarranted attention on Greece, life does go on elsewhere. Here are some notes from analysts at the excellent boutique brokerage and research firm Evercore and ISI:1) Deflation looming in EuropeThe ECB may have its hands full with Greece but it also failing to get traction on prices in the eurozone. The currency area's consumer price...

July has a reputation for fireworks in the stock market, with positive returns most years.Fortunately this year is no exception so far. Bespoke tells us that through Monday, the S&UP 500 is up 1.5% for the month so far, and bulls have history on their side the rest of the month. Over the last ten years, the S&P 500 has seen a median gain of...

Let's say that we can all agree -- yes, I'm voting on your behalf -- that once this whole Greek thing is put to bed people will look around and realize that eurozone stocks are too cheap. Doesn't it make sense to start considering right here, right now, which ones or which countries should rebound best?When you think about it, once the Greek thing blows...

Stocks sank Monday but finished well off their lows as investors decided that Greek voters' decision to stiff their creditors might not be the life-threatening event of the century it was presumed to be. After all, everyone knows the country simply cannot pay its outstanding debt, and no amount of finger-wagging, name-calling, foot-stamping or threat-making...

Normally the release of minutes of the Federal Reserve's rate-setting committee are the lead headline, but they had to settle for third place Wednesday. Takeaways however were dovish. A lot of the focus was on Fed concerns about developments in Greece and China, where conditions have taken a turn for the worse in the few weeks since the meeting.While...